If you think that government is force, you probably don’t think much of President Obama’s deceptive line about government being the name for things we do together. “Government is the name of things we do by force,” you retort.
But everyone understands that government is all about force, so we lie about it. When we propose more government we either claim we are fighting injustice, or we hide the fact that we are advancing a thug agenda based on force; we say it’s for the children.
So let’s look at the recently published “Progressive Agenda” and see what we find. . .
It is a demand for government favors: higher mandated wages, higher mandated benefits, more free baby-sitting. And never mind where the money is coming from; enforcement officers will deal with that.
Progressives like to talk about the glory days of good union jobs and good wages in the 1950s, and how Reagan ruined it in the 1980s. What they don’t like to talk about is the 800-pound gorilla in the room. You know what it is; it’s right there in the Progressive Agenda: immigration. If there’s one thing that has been creating income inequality in America it is immigration. If you want to know what is hurting the low paid it is high immigration legal and illegal. It’s simple supply and demand: increase the number of workers by opening the spigots on immigration and wages will go down.
The Progressive Agenda tells us that progressives really don’t care about low-wage people, for their agenda is a mess of thug politics that won’t really help anyone.
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-05-19 02:12:392016-04-11 11:01:00The Progressives’ Thug Agenda
Given the recent debacle involving ABC News, George Stephanopoulos, and Politico — which highlights the incestuous and corrupt goverment-media axis — I thought it was worth revisiting the topic of GOP debate moderators.
Recall that Snufflapoulos moderated several GOP debates in 2012 with sickening results. In one instance, ABC’s “paid Democrat hitman” suddenly shifted the topic from job creation to “banning contraceptives”, which was the Ass Party’s bogus meme of the month.
In August of 2013, after significant criticism of its choice of moderators, the Republican leadership suddenly announced a willingness to embrace the conservative wing of the party.
Sean Spicer, the Communications Director of the Republican National Committee, made a surprising statement: he said that Mark Levin should moderate the GOP debates. Levin formally accepted the offer.
I was able to interview Spicer at the time and it’s worth revisiting his remarks.
Ross: Sean, a recent statement you made really caught conservatives by surprise — and in a positive way. You said you thought Mark Levin and perhaps other conservative thought leaders should moderate GOP debates. How serious was that statement and did the reaction catch you by surprise?
Spicer: That was a very serious statement. Obviously, we’re not at a point yet of picking debate forums or moderators, but we are definitely committed to energizing the conservative base. It’s common sense: anyone’s who listening to Rush, Levin, Hannity… they are addressing the issues that the grassroots are concerned with.
What I also find absolutely unbelievable is that in 2008 Chris Matthews, of all people, moderated two GOP debates. Yet why wouldn’t we insist on the converse situation?
Now is the time to remind the RNC that we will hold them accountable for their statements.
Mark Levin and Sean Hannity should each moderate a GOP debate.
And I guarantee the ratings would break records. I guarantee it. (See “WORTH REMINDING THEM: In 2013, the RNC Said Mark Levin Should Moderate a GOP Debate”, originally posted HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-05-18 00:27:502016-04-11 11:01:02WORTH REMINDING THEM: In 2013, the RNC Said Mark Levin Should Moderate a GOP Debate
Since we published our article, “Catholic Church Captured by ‘Progressive Forces,’” it is starting to dawn on many in and out of the media that Pope Francis has come down on the side of the “progressive,” and even Marxist, forces in the world today.
Writing at the Blaze.com and commenting on the pope’s friendly meeting with Cuban dictator Raul Castro, Catholic writer Stephen Herreid of the Intercollegiate Review called the pope’s dealings with Castro and other Marxists “a new Catholic scandal” as significant and terrifying as the presence of pedophiles in the church. He wonders how conservative Catholics can continue to pay respect to a pope “intent on making friends with the enemies of religious liberty.”
Francis had a one-hour meeting with Raul Castro on May 10. The day before, Castro had greeted Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow. Francis will visit Cuba in September prior to his tour of the United States.
The Associated Press reported that Castro commented, after meeting with the pope, that the pontiff “is a Jesuit, and I, in some way, am too.” Castro added, “I always studied at Jesuit schools.” He also promised, “When the pope goes to Cuba in September, I promise to go to all his Masses, and with satisfaction.”
The evidence is getting too big for the major media to ignore: the pope has made common cause with the forces of international Marxism, which are associated with atheism, the suppression of traditional Christianity and the persecution and murder of Christians. (Read more from “The Catholic Church Has Gone Socialist” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-05-14 01:38:122015-05-14 01:38:12Opinion: The Catholic Church Has Gone Socialist
Today the Republican leadership will encourage the House and Senate to vote to pass the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) Initiative; the bill is known as “Trade Promotion Authority” or TPA – no one has even seen thousands of pages of Obama’s Secret Trade Bill – now the Republican leadership is saying “we will have to pass it to see what is in it”. The Republican leaders are planning to give Obama “Carte Blanche” to enter into “Fast-Track Trade Treaties” in “total secrecy” eventually with future countries such as Cuba, Iran, China, Russia, etc., because Obama will be able to add other countries to this agreement, which is UNCONSTITUTIONAL; it “short circuits the legislative process” which requires a two thirds majority vote of the US Senate to approve Treaties. Republican leaders are planning to give Obama unprecedented power to curtail Congressional checks and balances on Treaties, even while they have been watching him for over six years, violate Federal Immigration Laws, the US Constitution, and Freedom of Religion for members of the US Armed Forces.
The TPA Bill has many damaging provisions, among them, it will (1) allow millions of foreign workers to be given visas to enter the US at a time when 104 million Americans are unemployed, (2) open the way to import dangerous foods products that will negatively affect the health of unsuspecting Americans, (3) ship millions of American jobs overseas, (4) “force the US” to abide by UN and EPA business destructive unproven climate change regulations, (5) “force the US” to abide by the UN’s Small Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) which was voted down by the US Senate and violates the 2nd Amendment’s provision that allows American citizens to purchase and sell their small arms, and (6) it will force the US Congress to abide by every UN Treaty, undermining the sovereignty of the United States.
The TPA initially embraces 12 nations including the US, Peru, Chile, Mexico, Canada, Japan, Vietnam, Australia, Brunei, Malaysia, New Zealand, and Singapore; however there is a provision in the agreement that allows Obama to add other countries in the future, like Cuba, China, Iran, Russia, Venezuela, Libya, Syria, etc. The TPA is a secret Obama Law, like the secret Obamacare Law, that will allow the free flow of Mexican, South American, and Asian workers to enter the US (not only will the southern border remain wide open, but the US will no longer have any borders “at all”, or any barriers to entry), the millions of new entering foreign workers will willingly work for exceptionally lower wages under substandard conditions. Details in thousands of unread pages of this law have not been read or worked out, yet the Republican leadership is giving Obama “Fast-Track” authority to make any and all decisions in all and every treaty with the initial 12 countries and as many additional countries Obama decides on in the future, without Senate ratification (all future trade treaties will no longer be subject to the Constitutional requirement of a two-thirds majority of the US Senate for ratification). Republican leaders are enhancing Obama’s control of foreign policy, while making the Congress irrelevant.
In order to deal with the millions of Americans who will be losing their jobs because of the TPA Bill, under the radar, the Republican leadership of the House and Senate is crafting a bill to go along with TPA, known as the Trade Adjustment Assistance Bill to be passed on the same day the TPA Bill is passed – it should more appropriately be entitled the “Put all American Workers on Welfare Bill Because of the TPA Bill”. That new Trade Adjustment Assistance Bill – being promoted by the Republican leadership in Congress – specifically targets workers and farmers because many of them will lose their jobs once Obama authorizes secret “Trade Treaties” with foreign countries and devastates the labor movement in the United States.
Once Obama uses his “Fast-Track” authority to agree with UN Regulations, Congress would not be able to modify or amend those TPP provisions entered into solely by Obama himself – without Congressional involvement at all – and Obama’s individual decision would have the force of the “law of the land” under the US Constitution. This proposed “living agreement” by Republican leaders in Congress will seriously undercut the re-employment of 104 million unemployed Americans, because as a “living agreement”, it would leave the southern border of the US to be even more porous than it is today. It will also allow Obama to change immigration policy “at will” without Congressional approval. Obviously, those proposed provisions of the TPA are absolutely UNCONSTITUTIONAL. Republican leaders are approving the massive immigration of millions of illegal aliens from Mexico and from 12 other countries.
The Republican leadership will surrender its authority to write Federal Immigration Laws by passing the TPA, thus enabling Obama to use his pen to simply authorize the importation of millions of non-Christian Asian, Japanese, Malaysian, Brunei, Singapore, and eventually Chinese and Iranian workers. According to the Greek Catholic Relief Agency, for over six years, Obama has refused to allow any of the 300,000 Syrian and Assyrian Christian refugees in the Middle East to enter the US, while Canada has been resettling those Syrian and Assyrian Christians. Obama has only been allowing the entry of Muslim refugees through the UN Muslim Refugees Resettlement Program, and has been intentionally excluding Christians. Now the Republican leadership is giving Obama the right to bring in millions of Asian immigrant workers who are also not of the Christian faith.
Obama has been resettling hundreds of thousands of Muslim refugees in 195 cities across the nation without elected state and city officials being provided with specific details on who is being resettled in their cities, and without informing them who is going to pay for the health care, resettlement costs, transportation costs, education of refugee children, welfare costs of refugee families, food stamps, and housing costs for hundreds of thousands Muslims forced into their communities.
Supporters of this aggressive secret Obama initiative include Democratic Progressives in Congress, Democratic Congressman Danny K. Davis (received an award from the Communist Party in 2012), David Cortright (Obama’s close Chicago associate on the Committee for a Sane Nuclear policy (SANE)), Communist Tom Hayden (member of “Progressives for Obama”), Democratic Congressmen in the “Hanoi Lobby” (group aggressively supporting normalization of relations with Cuba), Cora Weiss (a strong supporter of Communism and a member of the Anti-War Movement), Adam Hersh (from the liberal Center for American Progress), the left of center liberal media establishment, and the Democratic Progressive Caucus. Those Leftists, Marxists, Progressives, and Communists have been getting the very aggressive support of the Republican leadership in the House and Senate, who have been working with the Democratic Progressive Caucus in Congress to pass the TPA (the 70 member Caucus includes Socialists, Progressives, Marxists, and Communists members of Congress).
The AFL-CIO Unions are on solid footing in their opposition to this “Fast Track Trade Promotion Authority”. Responsible and clear thinking Democrats in Congress are also against giving Obama “Fast-Track” authority with this labor damaging bill as it will allow millions of new workers to enter the US, will force the Congress to abide by environmental protection standards that will restrict business development and job growth in the US, will allow currency manipulation, and will allow millions of new Mexican Illegal Alien workers to legally enter and work in the United States. The Republican leaders in Congress should use some degree of “Common Sense” and wait for 19 months, before they give the occupant in the Oval Office any trade promotion authority, and only if that trade authority is very limited. Hopefully, the new occupant of the Oval Office, unlike Obama, will be a pro-American president who supports and abides by the provisions of the US Constitution.
Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions has alerted the American people about the dangers of the Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) speeding through Congress and the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal that TPA would help push. Senator Sessions said in a “critical alert” from his office, “The president has circumvented Congress on immigration with serial regularity. But the TPA would yield new power to the executive to alter admissions while subtracting Congressional checks against those actions.” Senator Sessions and several outside groups said Obama could change immigration policies between trading partners “at will” without any Congressional oversight. “The plain language of TPA provides avenues for Obama and trading partners to facilitate the expanded movement of foreign workers into the U.S. – including issuing visitor visas that are used as worker visas,” said Senator Sessions. The basis of that charge is a phrase in TPA calling it a “living agreement.” Sessions said that means that they can be changed after Congress approves them, and also that countries can be added in the future, including China. “It leaves it open for a president to change it without Congressional approval,” warned Jessica M. Vaughan, Director of Policy Studies for the Center for Immigration Studies. “Congress should not surrender its authority to write immigration laws to either the executive branch, to trade negotiators, and definitely not to international trade tribunals,” she added.
The Republican Leadership of the House and Senate are planning to give Obama free rein with “Fast Track Trade Promotion Authority”, with full the knowledge of Obama’s very dangerous anti-American track record, and his pro-Marxist/Communist initiatives. Even the most casual observer of Obama’s dangerous foreign policy initiatives can’t help but understand that, in the past six plus years, Obama foreign policy decisions have consistently favored the enemies of the Republic like Radical Islamic Terrorists in Libya, Communist China, Communist North Vietnam, Radical Islamic Terrorists in Iran, Radical Islamic Terrorists in the Muslim Brotherhood, Chavez’s Socialist Venezuela, Castro’s Communist Cuba, and Putin’s anti-American Russia – they have all collectively and repeatedly expressed their intent to destroy the Republic as it was created by the Founding Fathers.
A newly elected pro-American Patriotic US President would judiciously apply trade promotion authority negotiations by entering into separate Trade Treaties with 12 Asian and South American countries, while abiding by the provision of the US Constitution that requires a two thirds majority vote of the US Senate to approve each treaty. The American people need to rise up and oppose Obama’s secret TPA Bill by calling their Senate representatives at (202) 224-3121 and by sending FaxGrams to their Senate and Congressional representatives telling them to reject Obama’s “Fast-Track” authority which will permit Obama to enter into and force the Congress to abide by all UN Treaties, and will also permit Obama to enter into future secret treaties with countries such as Cuba, China, Iran, Russia, Venezuela, Iraq, Syria, etc. This most recent initiative by Republican leadership in the House and Senate, follows their inept funding of Obamacare, illegal Immigration, and Obama’s wide open southern border policy through September 2015. This most recent action of the GOP leadership is approaching insanity, akin to allowing the fox into the chicken coop.
(The author of “GOP Leaders Giving Obama Unconstitutional Authority” was interviewed previously on The Joe Miller Show)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-05-12 00:28:572015-05-12 00:28:57Call Your Congressman Today! GOP Leaders Giving Obama Unconstitutional Authority to By-Pass Congress in Approving Treaties
The number one goal of all governments is to control and dominate their own citizens. The more deceptively it can be done, the more complete and long-lasting the tyranny.
I have been telling you for many years that the face of modern tyranny is benevolent totalitarianism. Police state totalitarianism went out with World War II. The “Gestapo” knock at the door in the middle of the night and barbed-wire detainment camps are history, though there are steps in place to recreate them here via FEMA resettlement camps. Benevolent totalitarianism is an advanced stage of people control through mind control and mass psycho-political manipulation.
The individual (individualist) is an enemy of the state. Therefore individuality must be removed. So the individual and the nuclear family, which is an individual and sovereign unit, are under attack. . .
Government is attacking the individual and family unit in a myriad of ways: through social programs, class warfare and altruism, which is selfless self-denial to the point of literal self-sacrifice for a myth called society, and propaganda.
Social welfare programs are destructive to the individual and the family unit because they absolve the parents of their parental responsibilities and promote dependency on government. There are now “families” that for two or three generations have been wards of the state. Many if not most of them are without a male head of household. They depend upon the state to provide their sustenance, their housing, their transportation, their healthcare and their entertainment. They know nothing of individuality or personal responsibility. Their provider is the state, and the state is their god. It is 21st Century Baal worship. (Read more from “The Government’s War on Christianity” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-05-08 00:36:342015-05-08 00:36:34The Government’s War on Christianity
The authors of our Bill of Rights included the Fourth Amendment because they knew that one of the best protections against tyranny is to limit the government’s power to search its citizens.
Specifically, the Framers wanted to ensure that the federal government could not issue broad general warrants that would empower the executive branch to indiscriminately rummage through the private lives of American citizens — in other words, to spy on them. Unfortunately, that is exactly what the National Security Agency is doing today.
No, the NSA is not secretly taping every American’s phone calls. But it is collecting the “metadata” — who called whom and when — for every one of those calls. By themselves, each of these data points may look a lot like a harmless business records. That is why in 1979, before technology made it possible to aggregate those data points, the Supreme Court held in Smith v Maryland that the government could collect them without a warrant.
But when those data points are compiled by the thousands on just one person, or by the trillions on Americans as a whole, it becomes a different question entirely. Last year researchers at Stanford University found that metadata like that collected by the NSA under Section 215 of the Patriot Act could be used to uncover a lot of private information about a person, including his politics, what medications he takes, where he goes to church, and more. In short, this metadata can be used to paint a fairly complete picture of the private lives of every person in this country.
In a perfect world we could trust that the federal government would not abuse this power. But we do not live in that world.
In short, this metadata can be used to paint a fairly complete picture of the private lives of every person in this country.
In 2012, the director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, testified under oath before the United States Senate that the NSA was not collecting data on hundreds of millions of Americans. When it was later revealed that the NSA was doing just that, and had been for over a decade, Clapper admitted to the Senate Intelligence Committee that his earlier testimony was “clearly erroneous.”
If the government’s highest officials are willing to testify falsely under oath about domestic surveillance, we simply cannot trust them with the power to construct a massive database of every American’s telephone and e-mail communications.
That is why I am co-sponsoring the USA Freedom Act with Senate Judiciary Committee ranking member Patrick Leahy (D., Vt.) as well as Senators Dean Heller (R., Nevada), Dick Durbin (D., Ill.), Ted Cruz (R., Texas), Al Franken (D., Minn.), Lisa Murkowski (R., Alaska), Richard Blumenthal (D., Conn.), Steve Daines (R., Mont.), and Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.). House Judiciary Committee chairman Bob Goodlatte (R., Va.), Ranking Member John Conyers (D., Mich.), Representative Jim Sensenbrenner (R., Wisc.), and Representative Jerry Nadler (D., N.Y.) are introducing an identical bill in the House.
Our bill bans the bulk collection of domestic-telephone and e-mail records while still maintaining the government’s ability to collect necessary intelligence in a more targeted and traditional manner. And we need to act fast. (See “It’s Time to End NSA’s Bulk Collection of Americans’ Metadata”, originally posted HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-05-04 03:55:002015-05-04 03:55:00It’s Time to End NSA’s Bulk Collection of Americans’ Metadata [+video]
In our democratic system of government, a law has one legitimate meaning, and one meaning only, and that is the meaning that was given to it by those who made it a law. It’s a simple rule, and it’s not difficult to understand. Anything else is a perversion of democracy.
Unfortunately, we now live in an America where that perversion of democracy takes place routinely behind this magnificent edifice, where a handful of people with no respect for the rule of law slink around in black robes and decide for themselves which laws they will allow the people to enforce, and which they will simply throw out because THEY do not approve.
When Chief Justice John Marshall said it was the duty of the courts to declare the meaning of the laws, he did NOT say, and he did not MEAN, that the courts were free to rewrite them, to pick and choose among them based on their own personal prejudices and whims. But that is what now happens behind these doors.
James Madison and George Mason would not recognize the document that this Court calls our Constitution today. What our Founders called abominable “crimes against nature,” this Court has called a constitutional right. What our Founders considered the unconscionable murder of innocent, preborn babies, this Court now considers a birthright. If you don’t like your baby, feel free to rip it out, because this Court has found for you a constitutional right to do so, lurking somewhere in the penumbras and emanations of the Bill of Rights.
George Washington told us we should pray to God for guidance and wisdom before every public meeting; the Courts now tell us that to do so is a thing of evil — offensive to our constitution, and forbidden to our elected officials. To honor fallen soldiers with a cross or a Star of David is no longer a proper memorial: it has become, somehow, an impermissible establishment of religion.
And sadly, my friends, we are now perhaps only days away from this Court telling us that holy matrimony between one man and one woman, ordained by God in the Garden of Eden, recognized by countless societies over countless years as the most efficient unit of civilization known to man, is now merely a relic of a bygone age, no longer worth saving. Indeed, I fear this Court will go farther than that, and say that the people of America are constitutionally FORBIDDEN from preserving traditional marriage as the cornerstone of our civilization.
This is a state of affairs that would have been UNIMAGINABLE to Madison, or Jefferson, or Adams, or Washington. Indeed, it would have been unimaginable for Lincoln a century later, and even for my own father, yet another century on, who fought in Europe and in the Pacific to preserve a Constitution that, quite frankly, no longer exists. It has been completely rewritten in the last fifty years, turned on its head to mean the opposite of what its Founders clearly intended.
Scripture speaks to these times. The Proverb tells us that “[h]e who justifies the wicked and he who condemns the righteous are both an abomination to God.” Is this not precisely what this Court now does? Does it not exalt the homosexual and the atheist and the abortionist above the interests of the believers amongst our citizenry? Those who harbor traditional Judeo-Christian beliefs in matters of morality are now firmly in the crosshairs of our judicial system.
This is not the work of the Founders: it is the work of the judges and justices who have hijacked our democracy, and it is time for us to take it back. Lord Acton warned us that “[p]ower tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Well, that absolute power has indeed corrupted many of the justices who lurk behind these doors. They devote themselves to a life of wandering about, looking desperately for a seemingly endless array of constitutional rights hidden so deeply in the cracks and crevices and penumbras of our Constitution that they take centuries to be discovered — by enlightened jurists like Sonia Sotomayor, a completely undisciplined judge with a pedestrian intellect whose sole qualification for the Court was that she is a Puerto Rican female.
The sad truth is that while liberal Congressmen and Senators stand firmly behind their crusading, left wing activist judges, we simply do not have enough truly conservative Congressmen and Senators willing to support the more principled jurists, and actively fight the judicial radicals who have hijacked our democracy. Political courage is always a rare commodity. Many who claim to be conservative look upon social and cultural issues more as a grand inconvenience than as an opportunity to take a stand. If they defend challenged legislation at all, they do so half-heartedly, and secretly pray not that they be used as a vessel for change, but that the courts will take the sticky issues from them, so they won’t be asked to take a stand.
My friends, there ARE things you can do about this. Support the organizations you have heard from here today. Stand up and be heard. Be always accountable for your beliefs. Do NOT be intimidated by those who call evil good, and good evil. Speak your mind in your churches, and at work, and at play. The Congress has considerable political tools at their disposal to help the people resist the tyranny of the judiciary; we must elect officials who have the courage to use them.
Elect to Congress men and women who have the fortitude to hold this Court responsible for the acts of violence it commits against the constitution, and against the people. Demand the impeachment and removal of arrogant, defiant judges who abuse their lifetime appointments. Insist that your Congressman and Senators support legislation that would remove jurisdiction from the Courts to hear appeals in areas where they have outrageously and continually overstepped their authority — bills like Representative Steve King’s “Restrain the Judges on Marriage Act.”
And most of all, PRAY — while it’s still constitutional to do it. Pray as our forebears did so earnestly on their knees. Ask God to give you the wisdom to know what’s right, and the courage to stand up for it. Pray that this this country will turn from its wicked ways, that we halt our descent into cultural madness, and once again seek the face of God.
Kay Daly is the former North Carolina Republican Party spokesman who won the American Conservative Union’s prestigious Ronald Reagan Award at the 30th annual CPAC.
Last week I asked: Are opponents of same-sex marriage just rehearsing the same kind of bad arguments used in past decades to oppose interracial marriage? Are Christians who defend biblical sexual ethics relying on dogma or irrational prejudice? Are we engaged in hate speech when we argue the following?
What we mean by “marriage” includes by its very nature the union of a male and female. Same-sex marriage is simply impossible.
Raising same-sex unions to the same level as real marriage amounts to a legal fiction.
Forcing citizens to recognize and even participate in such weddings violates their civil and religious rights.
Destabilizing the very nature of an already fragile institution, the family, harms the most vulnerable members of society, helpless children and the poor.
Destabilizing the very nature of an already fragile institution, the family, harms the most vulnerable members of society, helpless children and the poor.
Does saying all this put us in the same moral sewer as racists who claimed that interracial marriage was unnatural, unhealthy and bad for society? If so, we deserve to lose. We deserve to face the choice that NY Times columnist Frank Bruni wants to impose on Christians: Change your doctrine, or go out into the wilderness with what’s left of the white supremacists. Your institutions will have to comply with the new status quo, or you will have to go rogue — lose legal protections, face fines and even jail time, lose tax exemptions and accreditation, and be treated by your country with less respect and tolerance than we grant Islamist imams who favor sharia law.
So let’s examine those old, bad arguments against interracial marriage, and contrast them with the reasons offered by defenders of natural marriage.
In the scholarly paper, “Miscegenation, Eugenics, and Racism: Historical Footnotes to Loving v. Virginia,” Paul A. Lombardo collected representative legal rulings issued by highly educated judges in support of bans on interracial marriage. They make for bracing, painful reading. While it’s often amusing to troll the exploded scientific and political ideas of the past, there’s nothing funny about the widespread acceptance of pseudo-scientific and pseudo-Christian racism. Such superstitions helped white supremacists such as the Klan keep in place unjust laws against interracial marriage, and gave eugenicists such as Margaret Sanger ammunition in imposing forced sterilization in a dozen U.S. states.
Advocates of same-sex marriage claim that our arguments against it are no better grounded, no morally different from these. Well, let’s gather them up and explain exactly why these racist arguments fall flat, and compare with them the reasons for defending natural marriage. Shall we? Below I’ll just give representative fragments of the larger arguments, which you can read for yourself in Lombardo’s paper.
Racist Argument #1
“[T]he off-spring of these unnatural connections are generally sickly and effeminate, and … they are inferior in physical development and strength, to the full-blood of either race.” (Scott v. Georgia, 1869.)
There is simply no evidence for this. In fact, it was the practice of inbreeding — whereby aristocratic white southern families preferred to marry close relations, even first cousins — that produced genetic defects. Anyone who has ever paid the vet bills for a pure-bred dog knows this much nowadays. Biologists speak of “hybrid” vigor, of the genetic advantages of “exogamy,” of crossing different strains within a species.
By contrast, same-sex marriage produces no offspring, not because of any medical problem among the partners, but by its very nature. It is not and cannot be fertile. So in one key respect, the biological, the verdict of science is clear: Interracial marriage is natural, and same-sex marriage is not.
Racist Argument #2
“The laws of civilization demand that the races be kept apart in this country.” (Doc. Lonas v. State of Tennessee, 1871.)
This is simply an unsupported assertion. Whose “laws” and whose “civilization”? Many flourishing civilizations allowed for intimate contact among different races. The Roman Empire, various vast and wealthy Muslim kingdoms, the Spanish and Portuguese empires — while they were often unjust in many respects — allowed for the free intermingling of people of different races, and extensive intermarriage. In fact, the idea of identifying “races” and keeping them “pure” is quite a modern one, dating back no earlier than the English conquest of North America.
By contrast, every human society of which we have any record regards the union of man and woman as the primary unit of society. None, not one, has ever recognized same-sex unions as the equivalent of marriage — no, not even ancient Greece.
Racist Argument #3
“[W]hom God hath joined together by indelible peculiarities, which declare that He has made the two races distinct.” (Green v. State of Alabama, 1877.)
In other words, God intended to create distinct races, and forbade them to interbreed. In support of this assertion, some Christians cited Old Testament passages that prohibited the Israelites from mixing their seed with the Gentiles’. But the Old Testament itself makes it perfectly clear that the difference between Jews and Gentiles was religious, not biological. Jews were not to marry pagans who worshiped idols and practiced human sacrifice. Pagans who converted to the worship of God were welcomed in, and no barriers whatsoever were placed to their intermarriage with the children of Abraham. For this reason, the Catholic church always declared that interracial marriage was perfectly moral — though in certain social conditions, it might attract persecution and therefore be inadvisable.
By contrast, both the Old and New Testaments unambiguously condemn erotic activity between people of the same sex. No Christian church or Jewish synagogue accepted same-sex unions until the 1980s, and those that changed their positions didn’t do it because of new “scholarly” discoveries, but because they were adjusting their doctrine to follow secular mores.
Racist Argument #4
“The purity of public morals, the moral and physical development of both races, and the highest advancement of our cherished southern civilization require that [the races] should be kept distinct and separate. …” (Kinney v. Commonwealth of Virginia, 1878.)
This is mostly empty rhetoric, contradicted by the facts. Cruel laws that forbade slaves from even marrying each other, and the practice of breaking up families and selling off wives and children, helped shatter the black family in North America — while in South America, awful as slavery was, slave marriages were conducted in church and families couldn’t legally be split. Nor were public morals improved by the intrusion of laws that required racial segregation — serving as constant temptations to cruelty on the part of whites, and resentment among oppressed blacks.
By contrast, heterosexual marriage is based entirely on the encounter with the other, on the need to accept, accommodate and learn from the profound differences between the sexes. It is now primarily social conservatives who insist that the sexes are real, grounded in humans as among other animals in the facts of mammalian biology. Many advocates of same-sex marriage, on the other hand, have accepted the unhinged assertions of “Gender Theory,” which pretends that one’s gender is a social and psychological figment, an empty construct. That’s why, at last count, gender theorists claimed to have discovered some different 50 genders — you can pick any one of them now on Facebook.
Racist Argument #5
“[I]f the issue of a black man and a white woman, and a white man and a black woman, intermarry, they cannot possibly have any progeny. …” (State of Missouri v. Jackson, 1883.)
The judge here had read some crank scientific opinion asserting that people of mixed race had fertility problems, and therefore mixed marriages should be banned. There was no real evidence for this.
By contrast, no defender of natural marriage wants to ban unions of older people, or sterile people. Nevertheless, we recognize that marriage exists first and foremost for the sake of children. Protecting their well-being is the main reason the state has an interest in regulating marriage. And solid psychological evidence suggests that same-sex marriage in fact hurts kids, that “emotional problems are more than twice as prevalent for children with same-sex parents than for children with opposite-sex parents.”
So there is no resemblance at all between objections to same-sex marriage and those to “miscegenation.” In fact, the people relying on cultural prejudice, ideology and outright pseudo-science are all on one side of this issue: the pro-same-sex marriage side . . .
We live in an age of sensationalism. We find ourselves in an era where every headline has to grab your attention, regardless of its substance in order to generate your digital patronage.
That’s the news industry in which we live.
I’m hoping this can cut through that.
To the looters, to the vandals, the felons, the people in Baltimore (and elsewhere) ruining this great Republic of ours: before you call me a racist, before you call me insensitive – understand that to use both would be an oxymoron.
It is my complete lack of any interest in your race, background, gender, personal beliefs and/or struggles that makes me an insensitive jerk. I accept that. It also makes me incapable of discrimination.
You are animals. If you are able to destroy the home or business of your neighbor, you’ve lost your humanity. If you are able to harm your fellow man, to scare their children, to do so with a clean conscience, merely because of something that some cop may or may not have done, which has nothing to do with you – you are a horrible human being. You disgust me, as you should anyone who wishes to be a part of civilized society.
Leftists will come to your defense and demand “understanding”. You deserve none. We are past the point of understanding. You deserve justice.
I reserve my “understanding” for the people you’ve hurt, for the businesses you’ve cost countless sums of money, blood, sweat and tears. If that makes me “insensitive”, then you are the one who is placing greater value on the grievance of the felons, than that of the tax-paying, law abiding citizen. You are siding with the criminal, over the local business owner.
I was raised in Canada, and moved to the United States as soon as I was legally able. This is not the America I sought. This is not the shining city on a hill which I admired from afar. It turns my stomach, and it makes me even more sick to know that people like me will be vilified for voicing these opinions.
This isn’t just a dark day for America, this is a dark day for humanity. These actions don’t merely bring shame on any individual race. Rather, the human race. To all the decent people left, kiss your wives and hug your children. We are on the cusp of darkness the likes of which this country has never seen.
Signed, One Insensitive Jerk.
(See “Dear Racist, Looting, Rioting Scumbags in Baltimore…”, originally posted HERE)
One of the more destructive behaviors of those engaged in politics is the willful conflation of political or moral arguments with constitutional and legal arguments. Nowhere is this more evident than with debate over coercing states to recognize same-sex relationships as marriages.
Tomorrow, the Supreme Court will hear two and a half hours of oral arguments in Obergefell v. Hodges, and three other cases in which district and appellate courts were split, on whether to toss out state marriage laws or not. Two months ago, the 6th Circuit upheld Ohio’s right to define marriage as a union between one man and one woman, thereby establishing a split with other federal circuits and creating the need for intervention of the Supreme Court.
What is before the Court?
In order to understand what is at stake this week, and eventually in June when the court renders a decision, we must first discern what is not before the court.
The court is not rendering an opinion, nor should it, on the morality or prudence of same-sex relationships. That is a question for society to answer.
The court is not rendering an opinion on whether two consenting adults have the liberty to live together in all ways. They certainly have that right and have been doing so for quite some time.
The issue before the court is whether there is a federal constitutional right for same-sex partners to obtain a marriage license, thereby preventing the people or legislators of sovereign states from defining marriage as it always has been since the nation’s founding.
This is not a question of religiosity or a debate over culture. That is a societal conflict that will be settled outside of court. Even the strongest supporter of homosexuality or the idea of a same sex marriage cannot deny the fact that there is no mention of any form of marriage in the Constitution. States have plenary authority over marriage. Justice Kennedy’s primary argument for overturning DOMA was that it represented federal encroachment on a state’s “broader authority to regulate the subject of domestic relationships” (even though DOMA only defined marriage for federal purposes); certainly it would be hypocritical of him to now create a federal mandate barring states from defining marriage.
Corrupting the 14th Amendment
Supporters of federal coercion contend that their aspirations are mandated by the Due Process and Equal Protection clauses of the 14th Amendment. But that is a prima facie absurdity because everyone in this country, including homosexuals, indeed have the right to marry. If they don’t desire or feel unable to marry the way the term has been defined since creation, that is not a denial of their due process. Remember, every homosexual couple also has the right to live together without a marriage, much like many heterosexual couples do in our generation.
What plaintiffs are asking is for the federal court system to simultaneously change the definition of marriage (which is not mentioned in the Constitution) while precluding states from maintaining their own definition through their democratic processes. It is simply beyond reason to believe that the 14th Amendment was drafted to prevent states from denying a status that nobody would have conjured up at the time, especially a status that runs counter to Natural Law and Common Law. In the very least, proponents of same-sex marriage need to use the democratic process to change the definition of marriage in order to achieve their goals. And judging by their bravado about recent polls, what do they have to fear from letting the people decide?
In order to assert a new fundamental right, the Supreme Court has laid out a constitutional test in Washington v Glucksberg (1997) when the court ruled unanimously that assisted suicide is not a fundamental liberty interest. The asserted right has to be so “implicit in the concept of ordered liberty” that “neither liberty nor justice would exist if they were sacrificed.” To prove a substantive due process violation of that right the court has ruled in Malagon de Fuentes v. Gonzales (2006) that the aggrieved person must show how this right is “deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition.”
How can anyone assert such a claim of a concept that was not even conceived until this generation, thereby bypassing the political process to create that right?
Where is this headed?
Furthermore, what plaintiffs in the marriage cases can never answer is this: if marriage – as dictated by federal courts – is no longer defined as a special union between one man and one woman, what is the definition of marriage? They would have to define marriage, in the course of redefining it. They would have to draw parameters but it seems there is absolutely no legal jurisprudence one can employ to include homosexual relationships in the definition of marriage and not polygamist or incestual relationships
If anything, there is more of a Natural Law argument to include those relationships before homosexual ones because they can procreate. Unless of course, the court here is more interested in solving a political matter, than a legal one.
Accordingly, there is no rational basis for any one of the Justices to decide in favor of coercing states to adopt homosexual marriages but not all other relationships. Yet, four and possibly five Justice are so driven by personal beliefs that rational basis and legal jurisprudence will never sway their decision. So what is this really about?
The only way the Court can arrive at the conclusion so many in the media are supporting is for them to create a new protected class carved out exclusively for homosexuals. By using the court to create a new fundamental right and protected class instead of the political process to resolve a societal question, the Court will codify the anti-religious bigotry we’ve witnessed over the past few years into law. An Oregon baker, for example, is facing a $135,000 fine for not engaging in involuntary servitude to provide a specific service for a homosexual wedding.
Perforce, what is really before the court tomorrow has nothing to do with liberty, love, and equality for homosexual relationships; it is all about corrupting the Constitution and using the boot of government to violate the individual and religious rights of the other 97% of the population. (See “What’s Really at Stake With SCOTUS’s Marriage Decision?”, originally posted HERE)
[Editor’s note: The following is a recent interview with this article’s author]
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-04-28 01:56:352015-04-28 01:56:35What’s Really at Stake With SCOTUS’s Marriage Decision?
